Alaska Cuts Mileage Earning Rates On Qantas

By: Ben Schlappig

Published: November 2, 2019

16 comments

Alaska Mileage Plan is one of my all around favorite frequent flyer programs, though unfortunately it looks like mileage earning has been cut on yet another partner airline (perhaps due to no fault of Alaska).

Alaska Cuts Mileage Earning On Qantas

Alaska Mileage Plan is cutting mileage earning on Qantas for travel as of January 1, 2020. It doesn’t matter when you book, but rather the new mileage earning rates are based on when you travel.

Here’s what the new mileage earning rates look like for travel as of January 1, 2020:

Meanwhile here’s what mileage earning rates currently look like:

As you can see, mileage earning rates in first, business, and premium economy stay the same. Meanwhile mileage earning rates in economy are being cut significantly:

H, B, and Y fares continue to earn 100% miles
G, K, L, M, S, and V fares go from earning 100% miles to earning 50% miles
N, O, and Q fares go from earning 100% miles to earning 25% miles

So this is bad news for those who flew Qantas economy but credited flights to Alaska.

The good news is that nothing else is changing about this partnership for now:

You can continue to redeem Alaska miles for travel on Qantas
Alaska Lounge members as well as select Alaska Mileage Plan elite members can access Qantas Lounges at select airports

You can continue to redeem Alaska miles for Qantas business class

Why Is Mileage Earning Being Reduced?

While no official reason has been given, my guess is that this is related to the new joint venture between American and Qantas, which sees those two airlines strengthening ties. Just a few weeks ago it was announced that American is improving mileage earning rates on Qantas.

With American and Qantas working more closely together, it’s not surprising to see Qantas get a bit of separation from Alaska, especially as Alaska and American also recently announced that they’re scaling back their partnership.

We’ve seen Alaska lose several partner airlines in the past few years

Bottom Line

It’s a shame to see mileage earning rates cut on yet another of Alaska’s airline partners. I love how Alaska has a unique array of airline partners, and I genuinely think they try their best. Unfortunately it’s likely that they’re often pressured into cutting ties or reducing partnerships, as other airlines work more closely together.

We’ve seen this happened repeatedly with Delta, as they’ve invested in other airlines and have formed joint ventures with them, leading to those airlines cutting ties with Alaska.

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TProphet Platinum

November 3, 2019, 11:52 pm

After my recent Qantas flight (detailed review here: https://www.seat31b.com/2019/09/qantas-a380-upper-deck-economy-class-review/), I received a survey from Mileage Plan that asked a number of questions about my usage of the partnership. It specifically focused on whether I chose to fly Qantas over other airlines because of it. I can't speculate as to whether Alaska was looking to support or counter the case for cutting mileage accural through the data gathered via this survey, but it appears they did at least make an effort toward a data-driven decision here.

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Chris Hannonen Guest

November 3, 2019, 6:33 pm

Yet another blow to AS Mileage Plan. It was perhaps inevitable and may well not have been within Alaska's control, but the end result is the same. Everyone's got their breaking point and this is mine. This devaluation is massive. It doesn't just put Alaska's earning rates for Qantas flights on par with American. Because Alaska only counts base miles towards status, only the highest fare classes will earn 1 mile flown = 1 elite qualifying mile for status while American will offer 1 mile flown = 1 elite qualifying mile for all flights, even deeply-discounted fares that only earn 25% actual redeemable miles. That means an AS-crediter in "discount economy" (which is hardly a "discount" given fares to / from Australia) will have to fly four times as many miles as an AA-crediter for the same fare class to net the same number of miles towards status. That is brutal. There were always compromises crediting quarterly Qantas trips with Alaska as the only perk of AS status with Qantas was lounge access, but the high earning rates and fantastic award options (albeit hard though not impossible to come by) kept me going. Now, not only is the earning incentive diminished, but the penalty on status earning makes it impossible to justify crediting to AS when I could earn status faster on AA for the same flights and actually enjoy the benefits of OneWorld. The TL:DR for Alaska is that my US-flying now shifts away from AS as there is simply not enough value left in the program from me as another global partner is lost / weakened. I'll miss those 55K awards when I could actually find them, but I can't justify it anymore. The scales have tipped and another one bites the dust. Time to cut the reigns and just pony up the fee for a Platinum AMEX and just stop chasing status with programmes that continue to offer less and less in return.

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Paolo Diamond

November 3, 2019, 3:00 pm

@ Zane Absolutely correct: this is QANTAS jiggery-pokery ( for which they are legend) rather than something initiated by Alaska.

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Zane MacFarquhar Guest

November 3, 2019, 11:30 am

Wasn't a major condition of the DOJ approval of the QF/AA JV that QF maintain its AS partnership? Seems like this is a big hit to the partnership. Moreover isn't this change likely initiated by QF since they then have to buy the miles from AS after you fly?

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Azamaraal Diamond

November 3, 2019, 2:55 am

Unfortunately this continues the downward spiral. AS "First" is at best anyone else's Premium Economy. I get really pissed when my International Business Award then gets stuffed into main cabin for my North America feeder which is often a transcontinental flight. Not even into their "premium class" economy. When I book for the same miles on AA I get AS First. Flying back from Portugal in March and have chosen to pay for Business on Tap and AC rather than a points flight on AS that would land in JFK and put me in cattle all the way to YVR. No way! The dollar cost was cheaper than the cost of the award and is Business all the way - and with GOOD LOUNGES all the way. Wouldn't it be nice if WestJet and AS formed a partnership?

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